On Being Happier: Thinking with Heart and Mind

Evaluating Artificial Intelligence With Heart And Mind

Evaluating Artificial Intelligence with both our hearts and our mind’s intellectual capacities reveals unexpected, powerful, and compelling ideas, as detailed in this episode.     

Reassessing Social Media With Heart and Mind

Show Notes for Episode 27  Our social media engagement adds value to our lives, at least that’s what it’s supposed to do. This episode explores some of the hidden aspects of social media that affect our experience and our children’s encounters. Exercises: Ways to think about the ideas developed in the episode: 1) The episode reviews several ways screens capture our attention, including the power in the machines themselves and the ways advertisers and creators use bells, whistles, and n...

Reversing physician burnout with heart and mind

Physician burnout is a widespread problem, and it can be reversed. This episode shows how thinking with heart and mind opens the door. Reversing physician burnout is vitally important to each of us. We are all patients. Exercises for interested physicians based on the episode: 1) What would you like your patients to say about your medical practice? How close are you to being that physician? What would you have to change? 2) Should thinking with the heart play a role in medicine? How mu...

Mental well-being with heart and mind (Part 2 of 2)

Show Notes for Episode 25 Mental well-being partially depends on how we feel about ourselves independent of our actions. This episode offers ways to strengthen this aspect of our mental well-being.   Exercises based on the episode: 1) Appreciate the idea that you are lovable and deserving of love, independent of anyone’s words or actions. 2) How differently you would feel if you knew you were loved for who you are? 3) How many different ways could you open to love?4) What using lo...

Mental well-being with heart and mind (Part 1 0f 2)

Show Notes for Episode 24  Mental well-being partially depends on how we feel about our relationships and our handling of the practical details of life. This episode offers ways to strengthen this aspect of our mental well-being.   Exercises based on the episode: 1) Think about your life’s practical affairs. Do you often feel personal failure when outer events don’t go your way? a) If this is a pattern, imagine letting go of this way of responding to your life’s challenges. b) If y...

Navigating political differences with heart and mind

Is it possible to maintain differing viewpoints and, at the same time, not lose our human connection? This episode says it’s not only possible, it’s important and provides insights into maintaining these bonds. Exercises for Episode 23 1) Remember a time when you interacted with a group of people without knowing their political views. Chose a positive experience. This could be a memory of a vacation, a work experience, or it could be from childhood. a) Split this group into two and arbi...

Thinking through relationships with heart and mind (Part 3 of 3)

Show Notes for Episode 22   When we use heart and mind to think through our relationships with our partners, spouses, children, and parents we can create richer and deeper connections. We are fully ourselves. It’s the art of living well.  An exercise: review the key points in the episode Partners and spouses: • Remember that we chose to live together to enhance our lives. • Consider regular meetings to discuss the specific challenges of living together. Spouses:   • Trusting ea...

Thinking through relationships with heart and mind (part 2 of 3)

Thinking through relationships with heart and mind (part 1 of 3)

Show Notes Episode 20: Thinking through relationships with heart and mind (part 1 0f 3) The following story typifies one aspect of thinking through relationships with heart and mind. It also sets the stage for the next two episodes: Yesterday a third-year medical student came to my office to work with me. The first two years of medical school are in the classroom. Students learn about the body, in health and disease. They spend the second two years with patients, learning to apply wh...

Episode 20 wkng mixdown

Show Notes Episode 20: Thinking through relationships with heart and mind (part 1 0f 3) The following story typifies one aspect of thinking through relationships with heart and mind. It also sets the stage for the next two episodes: Yesterday a third-year medical student came to my office to work with me. The first two years of medical school are in the classroom. Students learn about the body, in health and disease. They spend the second two years with patients, learning to apply wh...

Working through emotions and feelings with heart and mind (Part 2 of 2)

We can have better, fuller, and richer relationships by using what we learned about about working through our emotions and feelings and applying it to our relationships. Exercises based on the episode’s content: Exercise 1: Remember a time when you were criticized without your asking for negative comments. How did it feel? Were the comments helpful? Did they make you feel closer to the person who criticized you?               Why? / Why not? Exercise 2: Remember a time when you w...

LOVE: Its strength and power with heart and mind

Love uplifts and strengthens. Its power works through everyday life. It’s the art of living well. 

Working through emotions and feelings with heart and mind

Show Notes:   Episode 17: Working through emotion and feelings with heart and mind (1 of 2)  Exercises used to review the episode’s content Exercise 1: Allow yourself to fully experience your emotions. Exercise 2: As your emotions and feelings arise, note their origins. Are they from past hurts, frustration from present events, or are due to loss? Exercise 3: Explore the idea that love lives within and that wisdom is another name for love. If love is basic to being human, wisdom ...

Trusting Life: A Spiritual Journey With Heart and Mind

Show Notes:   Episode 16: Trusting life: A spiritual journey with heart and mind  Exercises for reviewing the episode’s content Exercise 1: Love is transcendent. The love one feels for a child, for example, crosses culture and time. That’s how it is with love from the heart, the love associated with compassion. Does this make sense to you? Exercise 2: We are containers for love. If love lives within us and passes through us, we are connected to the transcendent aspect of love. Do...

Trusting Life: A Spiritual Journey With Heart and Mind

Show Notes:   Episode 16: Trusting life: A spiritual journey with heart and mind  Exercises for reviewing the episode’s content Exercise 1: Love is transcendent. The love one feels for a child, for example, crosses culture and time. That’s how it is with love from the heart, the love associated with compassion. Does this make sense to you? Exercise 2: We are containers for love. If love lives within us and passes through us, we are connected to the transcendent aspect of love. Do...

Trusting Life: A Spiritual Journey With Heart and Mind

Show Notes:   Episode 16: Trusting life: A spiritual journey with heart and mind  Exercises for reviewing the episode’s content Exercise 1: Love is transcendent. The love one feels for a child, for example, crosses culture and time. That’s how it is with love from the heart, the love associated with compassion. Does this make sense to you? Exercise 2: We are containers for love. If love lives within us and passes through us, we are connected to the transcendent aspect of love. Do...

Trusting Life: A Spiritual Journey With Heart and Mind

Show Notes:   Episode 16: Trusting life: A spiritual journey with heart and mind  Exercises for reviewing the episode’s content Exercise 1: Love is transcendent. The love one feels for a child, for example, crosses culture and time. That’s how it is with love from the heart, the love associated with compassion. Does this make sense to you? Exercise 2: We are containers for love. If love lives within us and passes through us, we are connected to the transcendent aspect of love. Do...

Conquering self-doubt and self-criticism with heart and mind (Part 3 of 3)

Show Notes:  Episode 15: Conquering self-doubt and self-criticism with heart and mind (Part 3) Exercises for episode 15: Exercise 1: Remember a time when you felt overwhelmed because you had too much to do. This pressure could have been due to a school project, the demands of work, or trying to balance parenting and work. Besides feeling overwhelmed, how else did this make you feel? Did you enjoy such pressure? Did these feelings help you get through? Exercise 2: Think of an activit...

Conquering Self-doubt and Self-Criticism with Heart and Mind (Part 2 of 3)

Show Notes: Episode 14: Conquering self-doubt and self-criticism with heart and mind (Part 2 of 3) Exercises for episode 14: A review of the episode’s main points.  Exercise 1: Does the idea that we think with both heart and mind make sense? Where do you think with your heart and where do you think with your mind in your everyday life?  Exercise 2: Heart and mind working together As partners —Where do you use the mind’s objective thinking to carve out space for meaningful moments? ...

Conquering self-doubt and self-criticism with heart and mind Pt.1 of 3

Show Notes:   Episode 13: Conquering self-doubt and self-criticism with heart and mind  Exercise: The exercises for this episode have one theme: think through the ideas in the episode. See if you agree with them.  1) Picture your best times with friends, loved ones, while engaged in an activity, or during prayer / meditation. Were self-doubt or self-criticism present? What would have happened to those moments if self-doubt or self-criticism entered? 2) Were those who criticized y...

Successful, guilt-free inner work with heart and mind

Show Notes / Exercises — Episode 12:  Successful, guilt-free inner work with heart and mind                                            Play: Being a teammate Picture the benefits in being a good teammate and boosting others on your team See the various people in your life as teammates How could you help them thrive through your attitude and approach? Playfulness Look at your most difficult settings and situations Is it possible to see them differently? Could a spirit of p...

Successful, guilt-free inner work with heart and mind

Show Notes / Exercises — Episode 12:  Successful, guilt-free inner work with heart and mind                                            Play: Being a teammate Picture the benefits in being a good teammate and boosting others on your team See the various people in your life as teammates How could you help them thrive through your attitude and approach? Playfulness Look at your most difficult settings and situations Is it possible to see them differently? Could a spirit of p...

Attitude and Gratitude with Heart and Mind

Show Notes: Exercises for Attitude & Gratitude with Heart and Mind  Exercise one: Reviewing your attitude Consider your attitude in all the settings of our life settings Are you pleased with your attitude? Does it include your heart? If there’s difference between how you’d like to be and how you are, why is this so. What stops you from being the way you’d like to be?   Exercise two: Considering gratitude Do you think there’s a connection between gratitude and the heart’s love?...

Making decisions with heart and mind

Show Notes: Making Decisions with Heart and Mind   Exercise one: Review your life and test the episode’s idea  • Does good decision-making increase happiness? How? • Exercise two: Reviewing your decision making  • Think about these four kinds of decisions in your life. Which are you best at Which need work?  Intellectual / practical decisions. Decisions involving heart and mind First impressions  Decisions based on love and compassion   Quotations Sometimes one create...

Bonus

Show Notes: Bonus 9a A Daily Practice with Heart and Mind   Begin the practice before opening your eyes in the AM If you set your alarm, give myself an extra 10 minutes Turn off phone alarms without seeing any notifications Practice this, if necessary   Let in light and love Steps in Episode 9 Use an image of the sun poking through clouds Say a prayer or verse Stay with this feeling as long as you like   Cursory view of the day Glance chronologically See all the eve...

Bonus

Show Notes: Bonus 9a A Daily Practice with Heart and Mind   Begin the practice before opening your eyes in the AM If you set your alarm, give myself an extra 10 minutes Turn off phone alarms without seeing any notifications Practice this, if necessary   Let in light and love Steps in Episode 9 Use an image of the sun poking through clouds Say a prayer or verse Stay with this feeling as long as you like   Cursory view of the day Glance chronologically See all the eve...

Rethinking stress with heart and mind

Show Notes: Rethinking Stress with Heart and Mind Exercise: Letting in Light and Love Close your eyes and think of a moment when you experienced love. Any feeling of love works here. It can be a time when you felt another’s love, or it can be the feeling of love you have for another. It can also be the feeling of love you felt when with a favorite animal, or from another time in nature. The feeling of love experienced during prayer or meditation also works. Close your eyes and repeat th...

The psychology of heart and mind

Show Notes: The Psychology of Heart and Mind   Look at the settings and situations of your life: Do the ideas in this episode seem true? Does thinking with the heart, with love and compassion, differ from critical analysis? Consider how thinking with heart and mind play roles in your own life?   Look at the settings and situations of your life: How much of a role does this inner judge play? How much were you judged? How often do you judge others? How does being judged feel...

Finding purpose with heart and mind

Show Notes: Fining Purpose with Heart and Mind Look at the settings and situations of your life: Where can you increase practical effort? Where can you add heart? Look at the settings and situations of your life: What stops you from being more practical where it could be helpful? What stops you from being adding heart where it could be helpful? Note:  journaling, a dialogue with yourself on paper, might help here Making peace with life: Where don’t you feel at peace with your li...

Being present with heart and mind

Show Notes: Being Present with Heart and Mind Motivational review Look for moments in your life when you were fully present. Assess their value? Examine your encounters: Are you prepared to be present in them? Are you prepared to be open? Are you prepared to be welcoming? Think about changes: Consider the encounter you could improve What would you do differently? Notice: as you become clear about the changes you’d like top make, they will effortlessly occur. Practice being in...

Being present with heart and mind

Show Notes: Being Present with Heart and Mind Motivational review Look for moments in your life when you were fully present. Assess their value? Examine your encounters: Are you prepared to be present in them? Are you prepared to be open? Are you prepared to be welcoming? Think about changes: Consider the encounter you could improve What would you do differently? Notice: as you become clear about the changes you’d like top make, they will effortlessly occur. Practice being in...

Forgiving with Heart and Mind

Show Notes: Forgiving with Heart and Mind Kinds of forgiveness: Death bed > Picturing the wrong doer weakened and at the end of life Jaws of Life > Freeing ourselves from the grip of others’ actions Family gathering / business meeting > making peace to protect another Rain slicker > Blocking the negative words and deeds from entering   Tools of forgiveness Compassion for those who hurt us Getting free Allowing healing to take place Dropping the need to get even Having co...

Listening with Heart and Mind

To listen: to hear something with thoughtful attention   Part one: Greeting another • At various times during the day, think about the people you will encounter. Imagine yourself being fully present when meeting them and appreciating who they are. • Review your recent encounters. Were you welcoming? If not, picture yourself being at your best when greeting them.  • Set aside times to practice being present when greeting another.   Part two: Practicing listening  • Set times t...

Partnering Heart and Mind

SHOW NOTES Partnering Heart and Mind   When heart and mind partner relationships deepen, we’re fully present, and we’re ourselves. It’s the art of living well.   Part one: Decide which is your more dominant aspect, your heart’s warmth and compassion or your intellect’s practicality and problem-solving ability?   Part two: Partnering heart and mind Explore with the stronger of the two: Examine the value in this aspect of your self. See its role in your most important activ...

Lead with the Heart

Lead with the Heart When we lead with the heart we embrace the other. Part one: Picture the events of your day: Where do you work at being your best? Where do you know you should work at being your best but don’t? Where don’t you even consider being at your best? Note: Being honest and don’t judge yourself.   Part two: What ‘being at your best’ means? Consider the practical changes you know you should make. Consider the changes in attitude you know you should make. What do...

Think with the Heart

 Think with the Heart Part one: Look at your relationships and at the events of your life: Look for people that upset you Look at the frustrating situations See the ones you cannot change, or will take time to change Don’t relive the upset or frustration, just note it. Part two: Look at the relationships and events you cannot change — the driver who cuts you off, the boss / supervisor who’s not supportive, the relative who criticizes you. Imagine they no longer do this. See how muc...